Gambling to Become Officially An Addiction

BBC informs that The British Medical Association's annual conference warns against gambling to become a new type of addiction. The medical team calls for help to prevent and treat the passion for gambling, especially among teenagers.

Besides drug and alcohol addiction, this may be a serious problem mainly because gambling has been socially accepted and the fanatics can gamble on the Internet anytime, 24 hors a day, 7 days a week. The figures show that the number of gambling addicts has increased to 350 000 in UK.

Also, 25% of the number of children aged between 12 and 15 gamble and play slot machines, out of which at least 5% show signs of developing an addiction to this kind of games.

Dr. Jan Wise, consultant psychiatrist in London informs that starting a medical treatment for the gambling fanatics is impossible, at least for the time being, as there are other more important health and addiction disorders to be treated first.

Nevertheless, she is perfectly aware of the gravity of the problem, as she declares for BBC: "This problem is going to get worse and we need to look at how we can treat people as well as trying to prevent them... If we don't get a grip on this it will become a real problem."

Dr. Vivienne Nathanson of the British Medical Association also argues that: "We need to have a look at what the impact of this is and what doctors can do in regards to referring people for psychological treatments and lobbying government. If it gets out of control it can tear families apart and cause a whole host of mental and physical problems."

And she goes on by saying that the treatment would not consist of any kind of drugs, but of different kinds of therapies in order to make the addict aware of the fact that he can always opt out for healthier and much cheaper ways of entertainment.